Oak Park Tones Down Gun Law

Revision Ends Jail Term For Violators

The Oak Park Village Board voted unanimously Tuesday night to soften the penalties for violating its controversial ordinance banning handguns to make the law easier to enforce.

Fending off opposition from residents seeking a repeal of the handgun ban, the board amended it so that violators can no longer be sent to jail.

The revision to the ordinance, which was first passed in April, 1984, was suggested by Village Atty. Ray Heise to reduce legal complications that arose when the suburb tried to prosecute two people charged with violating the ban. One highly publicized case is pending.

Under the amendment, violators could be fined $1,000 for a first offense and $2,000 for any later offenses.

Under the original law, anyone convicted three times of violating the law could receive a jail term of six months.

The amendment was part of a long and controversial agenda that also included the bid by a black congregation to move to a local church and complaints that the Village President Clifford Osborn had violated the village`s ethics ordinance by accepting a free ticket to a football game.

Village officials first came under attack from residents who pressed the board to repeal the handgun ordinance rather than amend it.

Among those at the meeting was Lamar Richardson, whose arrest for violating the ordinance last year led the board to consider the amendment.

Richardson had been arrested on charges that he had violated the ordinance after Oak Park police, responding to a burglary call at his house, found a handgun.

Police said the gun had been fired by the intruder at Richardson`s son, who was not wounded.

``This proposed amendment tonight to the Oak Park handgun ordinance is a desperate attempt to try to convict the first black victim of the ordinance,`` he said.

Osborn admonished the crowd of 120 residents who packed the Village Hall to confine their remarks to the amendment rather than turn the meeting into a forum on an ordinance itself.

``This ordinance may not be your cup of tea, but it is a rational piece of legislation,`` Osborn said.

Among those who had pressed village officials to approve the amendment was Maureen Pisczor, who said that if the amendment eased the prosecution of the law, she was ``certainly`` in favor of it.

``I wonder when this incessant whining will ever stop,`` she said to those who asked that the village end the handgun ban.

She also noted that the law had been endorsed by village residents in a referendum in 1985.

But James Zangrilli, a chief opponent of the ordinance, said the board`s action was ``an admission that the handgun ordinance cannot be enforced.

``It says that there`s no jury in America that will convict an individual who defends himself and his property against armed robbers.``

Although the amendment effectively decriminalizes the bearing of handguns by making it a civil rather than a criminal offense, it also makes it easier to prosecute violators because the burden of proof is less onerous under civil rules of procedure.

The cases against Richardson and a gasoline station owner, Donald Bennett, in 1986 were controversial because in each case the village chose to press charges against crime victims.

The village argued that the cases fell under civil proceedings because the defendants faced civil penalties.

But the defendants argued that their cases were criminal because they faced a possible jail term, and the judge upheld the argument.

The handgun debate Tuesday night was followed by attacks on Village Board members for originally backing a plan by a local development group to purchase a local church.

On Monday the board withdrew its support for the plan, which would have prevented a black Chicago church from moving its congregation there.

``The black community of Oak Park feels betrayed and can`t let Oak Park continue to discriminate under the guise of racial diversity,`` said Webster Daniels, a resident who is organizing a local chapter of the NAACP.

But others said that village officials had been unfairly criticized.

``It is because we try and are trying and because we are pioneers that we become an easy target,`` Larry Hagen said.

In his first public statement on the proposed purchase of the church by the Oak Park Development Corporation, Osborn said he would be surprised ``if the acquisition was for racial reasons.``

At around midnight, the board approved procedures to investigate complaints from two residents that Osborn, whose relations with board members are becoming increasingly strained, violated an ethics ordinance by accepting a free trip to Indianapolis from Colts owner Robert Irsay to watch a professional football game.